This invention relates generally to processing within a computing environment, and more particularly to processing service requests and service responses using a service mediation model.
The ubiquitous nature of networks in general, and the Internet in particular, along with the large amount of inexpensive computing power available in centralized computer systems has increasingly led to the centralization of computer work through services such as web services.
Generally service providers provide services to service consumers. The centralization of services leads to stringent requirements on both the service consumer and the service providers in order to ensure that the services are consumed regularly with a minimization of service disruption. Over time this leads to tight integration between service providers and service consumers which negates some of the benefit that centralized services provided, namely the ability to share a single service with multiple consumers. As service consumers and service providers created increasingly distinct and generalized services and applications, complexities in managing the relationships between service providers and the various service consumers due to varying requirements and standards has arisen.